Star Scientific, Inc. wanted R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company to pay $1 billion for infringing its patents to make less deadly tobacco. Instead, U.S district court judge Marvin Garbis flicked away Star’s claimsand its patentslike so many spent cigarettes, and Reynolds walked away with one of the highest-stakes patent upsets in history. Garbis threw out Star’s case on June 26, ruling that the smokeless tobacco developer had schemed to deceive the patent office into concluding that an old tobacco-curing technique was new.
The case dates back to September 15, 1998, when Star filed a provisional patent application for a curing method that prevents carcinogenic compounds known as nitrosamines from forming in tobacco. The company, based in Chester, Virginia, was granted the first of two patents in March 2001. Two months later, Star sued R.J. Reynolds. Reynolds, a subsidiary of Winston-Salem, North Carolinabased Reynolds American Inc., filed a counterclaim in December 2001, claiming that Star’s patent was ambiguous and the company had intentionally deceived the patent office in order to obtain it.
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